Thursday, July 14, 2011

Facebook is going through some tough times right now, deciding whether or not their IM chat should be worth a shit or not, and currently lacks the ability to let be in "invisible" mode. I'm not an IMer. I just wanna check Facebook without getting into four spontaneous, contentless conversations by people I'm just digitally bumping into. So as I am ensnared, a window pops up from the friend of a child of an old room-mate (keeping up?) of mine:

Leilani 8 minutes ago

Hi Kana

kana 8 minutes ago

hi lei!

Leilani 8 minutes ago

are you by tori?

kana 6 minutes ago

sorry, hon. I haven't seen Tori in a long time. She's not back to Alaska yet.

Leilani 5 minutes ago

nope

well i'm going to get off and do something else ttyl

kana about 1 minute ago

k bye!

And that's it, folks. She was gone like the wind. If everyone was just that blithe and ingenuous -- and it wasn't considered odd, but rather the norm -- I think we'd have up to 15% more free time in each day.

Tuesday, July 12, 2011

As I might have mentioned once...twice...maybe a dozen times, I've been applying for a new job of late. It's an awful, exhausting business, trying to fool strangers into believing that you're a whole and normal adult who's totally going to positively contribute to their business. Full of lies and smiles, I refrained from telling boss after prospective boss about all my failings.

The fact that I'm a real person is probably the biggest setback. I am odd, individualized, inconsistent in my day-to-day attitude, scatterbrained, and generally unfit to do anything more regulated than maybe - MAYBE - brush my teeth everyday. I mean, come on -- everyday? That's, like, so monotonous.

So, I got hired from one of the fatcat bosses I lied so boldly to. They think pretend Kana is just who they need. I'm terrified that real Kana is going to come as a bitter disappointment.

Not this kind of model
And yet, surprisingly
close to the mark in effect

This woman is terrifying to me. She's one of those expensively maintained models that runs on success and attention. (By "model" I mean to dehumanize her into a machine, not claim that she rocks the catwalk.) She's fifty, looks thirty, has a private plane she doesn't use, a lakeside cabin she has no time to visit, two grown daughters who live thousands of miles away, and a giant house up on Hillside (the good part of town). She also has a terrifying way of letting her smile sort of sour and fade while you think about your answer to her questions, threatening to take it away entirely if you don't give the "right" answer - read, "whatever she wants to hear." And it's not always clear what that is. AAAHHHHHHH!

I'm going to be working with a lot of these high-motivation career types - this is Oil & Gas, where the big money's made. So not just fatcats, but oily fatcats. I can't believe they wanted me. I can't believe I'm planning to work there. These are not my people. I am going to be forced to talk to these phoneys and submit myself to their judgement and their bullshit for hours everyday. I've been hired. Dammit.

Things! Things! I MUST HAVE THINGS!!!

I just want to state my agenda to the Universe (by means of this obscure blog) right now; I want enough money to be able to do things, not money in its own right. I am not a "career" person. I am a "job" person. I go, I earn the money, go home, and then my real life begins. I value happiness over things, and while some things make me happy, I'm not going to save up a cavern of gold like Scrooge McDuck just to be ready to purchase every good thing that comes along.

"...and please don't hurt me." Forgot that bit

And to this awful lady, who reminds me so much of my last boss at the Spa job: I do not admire you. I do not trust you. You are a phoney. Do not reward me with your expensive fake smile.Your empty nest and heavily be-ringed fingers do not appeal to me, nor your unused glamor-items standing in hangars or by lakesides unattended. You are not what I consider an example of success. Do not look down on me, and tell me how "on" I was today. I will serve the public trust, man my post in your records library so that public access and accountability may be maintained. I will not buy into your byzantine private-sector-meets-public-sector game of lies, profit and smarm. So there!

And if I can hold to this rant, keeping it in a small, locked-up portion of my brain that remains pure of the bullshit I'm about to undergo, maybe I'll make it through this new job.